Old-fashioned light rail costs more to go slowly to fewer places

Dr Michael de Percy at the Canberra Metro light rail terminus

Burley Griffin’s 1911 award-winning design for Canberra envisaged mass transit in the form of electric trams. At the time, the major capital cities in Australia had electric trams to bring workers into the CBD from the suburbs. But in 1926, as the national capital prepared to host Parliament, the first public bus services began operating in Canberra. Buses provided cheap, reliable, flexible, and fast public transport that didn’t require the expensive and inflexible infrastructure needed to operate trams. The bus was a modern technological innovation that soon made the tram obsolete in most of the other capital cities.

My op-ed in the Canberra Times, Sunday 22nd October 2023, p. 25 https://t.co/GHrT0lBn7u

— Le Flâneur Politique (@FlaneurPolitiq) October 22, 2023

The people have spoken, but elite activists aren't listening

Prime Minister Albanese [Photo: US Secretary of Defense - CC BY 2.0]

Not only was it an expensive exercise at the height of a cost of living crisis, the Prime Minister oversaw a campaign that tore Australia apart along the lines of race like never before in this nation's history

University-educated activists were using the plight of Indigenous Australians to absolve their 'white guilt' - now they don't know what to do | Michael de Percy
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"It's not just here, it is a trend throughout liberal democracies

A liberal education teaches people… pic.twitter.com/P11fsezDgF

— Alexandra Marshall (@ellymelly) October 19, 2023

New Zealand’s dance with division is not over yet

New Zealanders aren't mugs, but they are not in the clear yet.

New Zealand’s October 14 election coincided with the Voice referendum where Australians decisively said ‘No’ to enshrining divisive race-based politics in the Constitution. Watching from across the pond, New Zealanders might reflect on the Australian experience that divided and continues to divide the nation as elite activists double down on their pre-referendum positions. However, New Zealanders may have little influence on the outcome as their Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) system forces coalition governments. This may mean the Act Party, the National Party’s junior coalition partner, will expect the government to test the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi by referendum. The decolonising trend that is currently shaking the foundations of Western liberal democracies is still evident in New Zealand politics. Indeed, it may well be a long, slow accident in the making if things don’t go in Chris Luxon’s favour.

New Zealand is not free of Woke yet

The decolonising trend that is currently shaking the foundations of Western liberal democracies is still evident in New Zealand politics.

The principles of the Treaty of Waitangi could be on the way to a referendum.https://t.co/EHLLIYMUki

— The Spectator Australia (@SpectatorOz) October 18, 2023